Even if it could have been proved against Mr. Nihil that he was lacking in the resolute peremptoriness of persons bred to command, this chaplain-governor was, however, not wanting in many of the qualities of a good administrator. It must be recorded to his credit that he brought in many reforms, of which time has since proved the wisdom. There was for instance the change he instituted in the system of hearing and adjudicating upon charges of misconduct. It had been the custom for the governor to rush off post-haste to the scene of action, and then and there administer justice. Now, Mr. Nihil resolved to take “the reports” the same hour every morning, “thereby economizing time, and having the advantage of previous calm consideration. Besides,” he says, “officers and prisoners are both much irritated when the offence is still fresh, and the frequent interruptions took the governor often away from other subjects which at the time had full possession of his mind.” Again, after a daring and successful escape, he recommends that every prisoner at night should be obliged to put outside his cell gate all the tools, etc., with which he has been at work during the day. An obvious precaution, perhaps, which is the invariable rule now with all men, especially “prison breakers,” but the necessity of it was not recognized till Mr. Nihil found it out. Although in his management of his officers he erred somewhat in being too anxious to obtain a standard of impossible morality, still he knew that more than mere admonition was needed to maintain order and obedience to the regulations. With this in view he instituted a system of fines, as the best method of insuring punctuality and exact discharge of duties. It is really a marvel how the Penitentiary had been governed for so long without it. Nor did his tenderness and solicitude for the spiritual welfare of the prisoners prevent his entering a sound protest against over-much pampering them in food. “I have frequent occasion to observe,” he remarks in one part of his journal, “the extreme sauciness of prisoners with regard to their victuals. It appears from Mr. Chadwick’s report, and the evidence that he collected, that the industrious labourers are the worst fed; the next best are the poor-house paupers; the next, convicts for petty thefts; the best are felons, with the exception of transports, who are still more abundantly supplied abroad. The idle and the profligate act upon the knowledge of these facts, and we have in the Penitentiary several of that description. Their fastidiousness and impertinence strangely illustrate the fact that our diet is much too high for the purposes of a prison.”